


when things get stranger

by shadeandadidas



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Drabble Collection, Post-Season/Series 02, Slice of Life, and I suppose I'm taking prompts as well!, basically just a collection of tumblr drabbles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-30
Updated: 2017-11-07
Packaged: 2019-01-26 18:31:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 4,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12563552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadeandadidas/pseuds/shadeandadidas
Summary: What happens in the in-between time of the seasons? The years we missed between Season 1 and 2? Post season 2?Drabble collection featuring that lost and future time.Most recent:“Focus.” Hopper says and El cracks open a single eye to glare at him. She tilts her head and one of the several books she had levitating and forcing to circle slowly around her cross-legged position on the ground, broke away from the group and flung into his chest.He smacks the book away and growls. She sniffs delicately, “Youfocus.”“You know, I like it better when you weren’t hanging around back-talking thirteen year olds. You’re learning bad habits.”





	1. Chapter 1

“Mike.” Lucas groans yanking on his arm and gesturing towards the school entrance, “Dude,  _come on._  We’re going to be late.”

Mike tugs his arm back, but rises up one stair; as if it would make difference in the distance he could see around the parking lot. Still, he cranes his neck and ignores Lucas’s groans. “We have to  _wait_.”

“Mike, man,” Dustin says from behind Lucas, “he’s right. We don’t even know if she’s-”

Mike shoots a look up at Dustin and cuts him off, “She’s coming.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I do.” Mike shakes his head and squints at the line of oncoming cars, “I just do, alright?”

Vaguely he hears Lucas snicker behind him. “It must be his powers of love. El-tuition, you could say.”

Mike flips off the vicinity of Lucas’s voice without looking at him. He’s not wrong though. He and El have this… it’s like they’re on the same wave-length sometimes. Like last night; last night Mike  _felt_  her, her excitement, overwhelming and bright, even as he didn’t see her at all yesterday. Just like when she was gone, sometimes he swore he could feel her in the back of his mind. Only this time there wasn’t a trace of sad longing, only elation and he just  _knew_  that today was the day she’d be here.

But he couldn’t very well explain that to the boys. Even if they knew how he felt about El. It was just too embarrassing. 

He squints one more time, looking for the rusty, tanned color of-

Hopper’s truck. It tears into the parking lot without any regard for the tiny blue Chevy it almost bowls over. He could almost hear the Sheriff’s muttered curse as the Chevy owner’s neon-colored-hair teenager shoves her body out the window and wavers her middle fingers.

Mike grins and points, “There!”

He glances behind them to watch Lucas and Dustin and Will catch sight of the car. They all grin at each other and take off towards the car line. Mike is the first one to the curb, Dustin slamming into his back and sending them both off the edge and into the street. 

Hopper rolls down the window as he pulls up and calls out, “Can we try to make it through the year without any unnecessary deaths, please? Get your asses back on the sidewalk.”

“Yessir.” Mike and Dustin called out simultaneously before swatting each other on the chest.

Hopper nods, satisfied. And then-

El peaks her head out and waves. 

Dustin cheers, “El! Nice of you to join us, milady. Are you ready to be introduced to Hell on Earth?”

El squints, “Hell?”

Lucas waves his hands in presentation, “High School. Let’s go, we’re going to be late for first period.”

El turns back to Hopper, who gives her an encouraging nod. She unbuckles and climbs out of the car, immediately shuffling up to Mike’s side.

She’s wearing a blue dress, brown curls pinned back by a purple headband. She looks everything and nothing like the girl Mike found in the woods. Everything because her eyes (bright, brown full of fire) were the same; but nothing because gone was the trembling and the distrust, and in place of it was this girl who had saved the world. 

Mike opens his mouth, but Will beats him to it, “You look beautiful, Eleven.”

“ _Jane_ ,” Hopper cuts in, “She’s registered under Jane for the teachers. Call her El if you want to make up a backstory for it, but not Eleven. We don’t want to arouse suspicion.” 

Mike brushes his shoulders with El gently, “You look beautiful, El.”

El smiles and bumps her shoulder back at Mike, but doesn’t say anything. Above head, the warning bell dings and Lucas cusses, hurrying them up.

“One more thing!” Hopper puts on his heaviest Dad-glare, “I better not get  _any_ reports of things moving on their own, you hear me El? No funny business at school.” Hopper cuts his gaze to Mike, “I’m putting you in charge of that, Wheeler. This only works if everything goes smoothly.”

Mike unthinkingly puts a protective arm around El, but it’s Dustin who speaks, “We got it Chief. El is going to be like Clark Kent. Superhero at home, one of the nerds at school!”

El shifts and whispers, “Nerd?”

Mike grins and turns her around, promising to tell her later, and all of them make a mad dash for the door. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mike forgets sometimes that El being out and about in the world as a functioning, visible person in society meant that she was like _actually visible_ to other people.
> 
> And by people, Mike means other boys.

Mike forgets sometimes that El being out and about in the world, as a functioning, visible person in society meant that she was like  _ actually visible  _ to other people.

And by people, Mike means other boys.

“What do you think she sees in him?” Mike asks, ripping bits of his ham sandwich into little, mushed up pieces. 

Lucas takes a bite of his pizza, glances over at where El is in line for a carton of milk, and rolls his eyes. Dustin pauses chewing his cookie, crumbles and bits of chocolate caught in the corner of his mouth, “I think Aaron Miller walked up to her .05 seconds ago and she has no idea what to do when someone who isn’t  _ us  _ approaches her.”

Mike harrumphs, eyeing the way Aaron Miller, with his fake-leather jacket and blonde slicked back hair, laughs loudly and dips his head in response to the bewildered look on El’s face. He looks like Danny Zuko from Grease. 

_ El loves Grease _ , Mike thinks grimly. 

He drops the mauled remains of his sandwich and makes to stand up-

Right in time for Max to slam her own lunch tray down in front of him, “Sit right back down, Mike Wheeler, and stop glaring at them.”

Mike does, albeit grumbling, “I wasn’t going to do anything.”

“Sure you weren’t.” Max folds herself onto the bench.

“I wasn’t.” he defends, but knows even before Max shoots an unimpressed glare at him that he was lying.

It’s just El is… she’s- well, El is beautiful. Stunning really, and clever and smart in a quiet way and it completely escapes him why she chooses to still hang out with nerdy Mike Wheeler and his friends now that she’s free. It’s not like she hasn’t been approached by multiple groups in Hawkins High; curious about the girl who suddenly appeared as Chief Hopper’s daughter, the one who never really speaks unless spoken too, but just  _ looks _ like she knows everything about everyone without saying a word. 

El is a superhero in disguise and Mike is a no one. 

Will kicks him under the table and tilts his head towards where El and Aaron are standing. While Aaron’s mouth is running non-stop and his hands are gesturing wildly, El’s head is turned, eyes combing the cafeteria for  _ something _ . Mike sits up a little straighter and thinks at her really loudly.

_ El. _

Her eyes snap to him and she gives him a relieved smile. Mike gestures her over and she comes, patting Aaron on the arm awkwardly and turning on her heel. Aaron looks stupefied at the turn around, but shrugs and continues his story to the redheaded girl standing in front of where El had been.

“You didn’t get your milk,” Mike greets her dumbly, before kicking himself. He passes her his unopened carton, “You can have mine.”

El beams, “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Mike looks up to find the rest of the table staring at them. Dustin’s crunches have slowed as his eyes bounce in between the oblivious El and Mike and Lucas,  _ Lucas _ looks so unimpressed, “This is painful, man.”

Will snickers, before ducking back into his goldfish.

Mike glares, “Shut the hell up.”

“Are you hurt, Lucas?” El bites at the corner of her thumb nail, “Pain?”

Lucas is quick to assure her, “Not that kind of pain, El. More like… embarrassment on behalf of our good friend Mike.”

Her eyes shoot to him, “Why?”

“Because I have such awful friends.” Mike throws a piece of abused crust as Lucas’s face. 

El raises an eyebrow the way she does when she’s mentally saying  _ friends don’t lie, Mike _ but bless the lord, she doesn’t call him on it. She just shuffles a little closer on the bench until their thighs are touching.

Mike blushes into his ruined sandwich bites and steadfastly ignores the way Lucas is laughing at him.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> These things get better with time, but then there is another secret that lurks in the back of his mind always. It existed far before his brush with the Upside Down and he’s started to think that it will exist long after all of his other secrets come to light.

There are things that Will Byers never tells anyone. 

He doesn’t tell his mom that even now, months after being set free from the Mind Flayer, that he still has nightmares. He doesn’t tell Jonathan that the reason he catches Will sitting in the kitchen, staring at the wall at 3am is because he hasn’t been to sleep yet; that the idea of sleep, of not being able to control what’s going on around him, of being  _ blind _ , is terrifying. 

He doesn’t tell Lucas or Dustin or Mike that sometimes he’s not sick when he skips school; he’s actually just too terrified to get out of bed.

These things get better with time, but then there is another secret that lurks in the back of his mind  _ always _ . It existed far before his brush with the Upside Down and he’s started to think that it will exist long after all of his other secrets come to light. 

It flares up sometimes; when Will is too happy or excited or exhausted to ruthlessly shove the feelings back down. When he’s swimming at the Quarry with his friends (white skin in the sunlight, abs gleaming), when he’s watching football practice because Dustin just made the team (it always seems to be shirts vs. skins,  _ because of course _ ). It flares up when Gavin Meyers dresses up as Ren from  _ Footloose _ for Halloween (white shirt, tight black jeans, hair combed back.)

Mike had nudged him when he got lost staring-- just in time to avoid Gavin’s group of jock friends from catching him. Mike opens his mouth when the ghost is clear, but Will changes the subject and doesn’t bring it up again for a long time.

And it’s not like Will doesn’t know that his friends- his mom and dad and brother- at least suspect that there is yet  _ another _ thing wrong with Will Byers, but he can’t tell them. He can’t. He’s already irrevocably changed so many people’s lives that shaking things up again with  _ this _ is too much.

(He thinks there ought to be a quota on how  _ different _ a person can be. He thinks he would have surpassed that one a long time ago.)

(He thinks people have just started getting over calling him  _ Zombie Boy _ .)

“You can talk to me, you know,” Mike tells him one day, when they are all down at the lake outside of Hopper’s cabin, “About anything. You’re my best friend.”

Will closes his eyes and points his face toward the sunlight peaking through the leaves. “I know.”

“Are you sure?”

Will nods, eyes still tightly shut, heart pounding, thinking  _ not yet not yet _ .

He cracks an eye open and Mike looks so troubled, so desperate for Will to be okay that Will feels guilty for being anything but.

Will sighs through his nose and whispers, “I’m not ready.”

Mike nods once and bumps his shoulders with Will, looking out to where El is laughing and Lucas is through Max over his shoulder in the water. El turns back to them and waves and Mike’s  _ face _ . The love there, Will is desperate to feel that sometime.

“I’ll be here whenever you are.” Mike says, and drags them both to the lake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments, critiques, prompts always welcome!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve Harrington has had a rough week, alright?
> 
> He’s been broken up with, kicked, punched, knocked out, low-key kidnapped and thrown in a car by a bunch of preteens, and chased by flesh-eating dogs. Demodogs, whatever.
> 
> So Steve Fucking Harrington thinks he deserves at least a solid week of sleep.
> 
> But apparently the universe does not agree.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Tumblr prompt: Anyway, I had a prompt for the drabbles; a story with Nancy, Steve and Jonathan, doesn't have to be romantic, either that or just friendship both'd be great!_

Steve Harrington has had a rough week, alright?

He’s been broken up with, kicked, punched, knocked out, low-key  _ kidnapped _ and thrown in a car by a bunch of preteens, and chased by flesh-eating dogs.  _ Demodogs _ , whatever.

So Steve  _ Fucking _ Harrington thinks he deserves at least a solid week of sleep.

But apparently the universe does not agree, because on Saturday morning, two days after the Mind Slayer  _ thing _ was finally controlled and demolished by the punk-goth thirteen year old Wheeler Junior has a kid-boner for, his ass is woken up by one person he thought he’d never see in his room again.

But there she is, in a form fitting pink sweater. 

“Nancy?” he groggily asks, wondering if he should maybe cover his naked chest and smooth down his atrocious bedhead.

Nancy gives him a smile and  _ what the fuck is going on right now _ , “Why are you still in bed?”

He squints at his alarm clock, “It’s 8am?”

She blinked, clearly surprised, “Really? Huh.”

“Is he up, Nance?”

Jonathan Byers pokes his head into the door frame and gives Steve an awkward wave. This time Steve definitely does adjust the sheet, “What the hell is going on? Is the world ending again? Are we still on aliens or has it moved to like- clowns or something?”

Nancy rolls her eyes, “We’re getting pancakes.”

“How delightful,” he throws himself back onto his pillow and shuts his eyes, because he does not want to imagine them licking syrup off of each other’s lips or feeding each other bits of pancakes or other cute shit like that. He’s still a wounded man, after all. “Have fun, you two.”

Nancy doesn’t have that. “You’re coming.”

“Why do you want me there?”

Nancy is silent for a moment, before she sits on the corner of his bed and picks at the sheets resting there. Steve waits patiently, because he knows Nancy. Knows that she’s not one to speak without weighing out every word (unless she’s drunk, as it turns out). She finally rolled her head to the side and met Steve’s eyes, “I just- you’re still one of my best friends, you know? One of the best guys I know. And I didn’t handle us the way I should have,  _ no shut up _ ” she says when Steve makes a dismissive face, “I want us to still be okay. All of us. You’re apart of the family.”

Steve cracks an eye back open, wondering if he has it in him to argue. He has so many emotions threatening to burst from him. He wants to shake Nancy and tell her  _ don’t you see? Don’t you see how bad it hurts? _ But then he also wonders what the alternative would be. Never seeing them again? Forgetting about the past week and last year? Going on with his life, ignoring them in the halls, content to fade back into feigned ignorance?

He glances at Jonathan who looks almost as uncomfortable as he does. But then Byers shrugs and nods once in agreement.

Steve sighs and that’s that.

Forty minutes later (“Jesus  _ Christ _ , Steve, it takes you longer to do your hair then me.” “Zip it, Nance, perfection takes effort.”) and they are sitting in a shitty diner at the edge of Hawkins and Jonathan is watching in grotesque fascination Steve take down two stacks of pancakes. Nancy, who is by far used to Steve’s appetite, orders oatmeal for her and an order of waffles to go.

Steve blinks at her. She shrugs, “Mike is going to see El later.”

“Oh.”

They all make small talk for a long while. Steve asks what Jonathan has been up to in the last year, college plans, new movies to go see. It’s all pretty softball stuff- the three of them attempting to reorient themselves in this new reality of shifted relationships. Nancy is valiant in her effort to force the two to speak to each other almost as much as her. It’s not until Jonathan asks Steve what his plans are, that there is truly progress though.

Steve shrugs, “I’ll probably stick around here, you know? Work for my dad.”

Nancy makes a face, but Jonathan ignore it. “Insurance? Why do that when you could be like-- Hopper’s deputy.”

Steve lowers the forkful of pancake from his mouth, “What?”

The other boy shrugs, “I mean, it wouldn’t hurt to ask, right? And training is only a month or two… pass a test, start working out. You could like- take over for him when the time comes. And you’d be plugged in to all of the weird shit that goes around in Hawkins, right?”

Steve’s mouth tips open because, fuck yeah, he could do that. He never even thought about being a cop. He’s learned from the kids that he has some kick-ass protective tendencies and he’s like 98% sure that the other Hawkins police crew are about as useless as Nancy’s father, so-

So.

“Huh,” Steve says, and takes another bite of pancakes. “That’s not a half-bad idea, Byers.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Does it ever freak you out?” He asks one day, he and Mike sitting on the floor of Will’s room eating the crust off of their PB&J sandwiches.
> 
> Mike raises an eyebrow and shoves the rest of the WonderBread in his mouth, licking his fingertips, “Does what freak me out?”
> 
> “Being in love with El so young.”
> 
> Mike promptly chokes on his bread.

If there was one thing Will had no concept of yet, it was love. Or rather- he’s so surrounded by  _ love _ constantly with his mom and brother and friends,and even the Chief. So maybe what he meant was the at fourteen years old, Will had no concept of being  _ in _ love.

It was like this futuristic, mythological being. Like a sunrise over the Hawkins lake or an emotion he’s read about and drawn about in his free time holed up in his room. It’s confusing, he thinks, not only because he’s so young and what he wants doesn’t necessarily line up with what most boys his age do, but it still interests him.

Love. Being in love.

It interests him the most when he sees it in action.

“Does it ever freak you out?” He asks one day, he and Mike sitting on the floor of Will’s room eating the crust off of their PB&J sandwiches.

Mike raises an eyebrow and shoves the rest of the WonderBread in his mouth, licking his fingertips, “Does what freak me out?”

“Being in love with El so young.”

Mike promptly chokes on his bread, coughing and heaving and eyes-watering while a red flush creeps up his neck and settles in his cheeks. When Will thinks he’s no longer in danger of dying (and death by PB&J? Dustin would never let him live it down), he lets out a croaks, “In love? Me? Who says I’m in love?”

Will settles an even look at his best friend, “Why exactly were you so exhausted this morning at school?”

Mike splutters, face going even more red. 

(The answer was that Mike was up at 5am because he had to sneak out of El’s bedroom and go home before the Chief woke up. It’s not like they were doing anything untoward- they were all only 14 after all- but Mike says that sometimes El has trouble sleeping and calls out for him, whether she realizes it or not. He doesn’t think Mike has ever ignored a call.)

“That’s- that’s not-” Mike stops picking at the corner of his thumbnail. “It’s not scary.”

Will hums in interest, “No?”

Mike, if possible, goes even more red. He shrugs, “No. It’s El, you know? She’s… we’re… it’s just easy being around her. It always has been like that.”

“But what happens if you break up?”

Mike blinks as though that’s a foreign concept, “Um… well then she will still be one of my closest friends? But like- I don’t think.” Mike stops and thinks really hard for a minute, “Look, it sounds really stupid but… okay, you know those friendship necklaces the girls in our class wear? The ones that are like, two halves of a heart and they fit together and it’s really cheesy?”

Will nods. Mike does the same, “That’s like El and I. She’s one half and I’m the other. It just fits.”

Huh, Will thinks, “What about the Chief?”

Mike shudders, “What about him?”

“Isn’t he weird about you and El being together?”

He looks green, “Last week, he was cleaning his gun when I came over to bring El her tutoring work. Like right there, in the kitchen. He just stared at me for forever and then went right back to cleaning it. I think he’s like a lion and smells fear.”

Will knocks his shoulder, “Don’t worry, Wheeler, El will protect you.”

Mike reaches over and smacks Will upside the head, “You’ll get it, someday Byers. Some girl will come around and you’ll get it.”

Will looks down at his lap, feeling suddenly a bit sick, “Yeah, sure.”

_ Some girl. _

He feels a hand on his shoulder and meets Mike’s apologetic eyes, “Some _ one _ . You’ll meet someone and it will make sense.”

  
Will clears his throat and offers Mike the last bit of his crust, content to save  _ that  _ topic for another day.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Focus.” Hopper says and El cracks open a single eye to glare at him. She tilts her head and one of the several books she had levitating and forcing to circle slowly around her cross-legged position on the ground, broke away from the group and flung into his chest.
> 
> He smacks the book away and growls. She sniffs delicately, “ _You_ focus.”
> 
> “You know, I like it better when you weren’t hanging around back-talking thirteen year olds. You’re learning bad habits.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really can't thank everyone enough for all the comments and love I get on my bored little drabbles. I'm going to go on a reply-streak in a bit, but until then.... thank you so much!

“Focus.” Hopper says and El cracks open a single eye to glare at him. She tilts her head and one of the several books she had levitating and forcing to circle slowly around her cross-legged position on the ground, broke away from the group and flung into his chest.

He smacks the book away and growls. She sniffs delicately, “ _ You _ focus.”

“You know, I like it better when you weren’t hanging around back-talking thirteen year olds. You’re learning bad habits.”

El wonders how mature it would be for her to repeat what Hopper had said in a baby-mimicking-voice, like Nancy sometimes does to Mike, but one warning look from Hopper says that he’d have zero problems taking away her Eggo-and-Mike privileges for the foreseeable future.

So she just huffs and nods at the fallen book to return to the fray. She closes her eye again and focuses, feeling her mind spread out and caress the books with her power, holding them,  _ controlling _ them.

There’s something about this. Something about knowing she had the power to control these inanimate object and make them bend to her whims without effort.

In her peripherals, she could hear Hopper, “Good, El. Now add in the records.”

She opens her eyes, staring past Hopper to the stack of records and wills them to come to her. One by one, they drift up and to her circle of floating books, stuttering slightly before joining the rotation. She was down to the last two when something in the back of her mind pinched and warmth rushed down her nose.

Everything dropped to the floor in a loud clatter. El slumps a bit, more disappointed than woozy, but Hopper rushes forward to break her fall with his arms, “I got you kid.”

El groans, wiping at her nose and glaring when it came away red. Hopper bats her hands away and wipes at the rest with his own thumb. 

Her head hurt, and she felt like she'd run a mile. “No more.”

Hopper nods immediately and brushes back an errant curl, “No problem. Done for today. It was good, you got three more records than you did yesterday. Tomorrow, you’ll get them all without bleeding.”

El felt a sudden swell of emotion, of  _ thankfulness _ , because Papa never would have taken her at her word. He never listened to how sick she felt or exhausted she was. He only pushed and pushed and pushed until her eyes bled and she threw up in her small little room. 

( _ No more, _ she used to beg,  _ It hurts, Papa, no more nomorenomore _ )

El burrows a little further into Hopper’s arms. He never did that; never pushed her too far, only ever listened to her, pushing through her lack of verbal cues and looked deeper. The only person she felt more implicit trust in was Mike and that was because he was the first and best friend she had ever had.

_ Different _ , she thinks absently in her feelings on the two men.

“You want an Eggo?” Hopper asks, adjusting El so that she’s sitting on the couch.

El shook her head. Joyce Byers says that Hopper spoils her and he shouldn’t give El a reward every time she does something good. She says it’ll give El a complex.

(El doesn’t like that, but she like Mrs. Byers, so she’s trying to work with her.)

Hopper glances at her knowingly, “You want the walkie to call Mike?”

El widens her eyes innocently and Hopper rolls his eyes, “We’re going to have to have a chat about that someday, you know.”

But he pops into her room and tosses her the walkie-talkie without much fight.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you like it! Always taking prompts/ideas. And if you want to come on down and talk to me, hit that comment button and let's get rowdy :D
> 
> Find me on Tumblr: shadeandadidas


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